About Us

Who We Are And Why Our Products Rock

Thanks for checking out Spruce on Tap! We recognize there are other spruce suppliers on the market, but here are a few things that make our product stand out over some of the others:

Our products are fresh harvested and then immediately vacuum packed and frozen. Beware of terms like "cold dried" or "dehydrated". You will not be getting all the freshness you could be! Our products are never dried or dehydrated. They taste and smell just like the day they were harvested - fresh!

We always tell you what kind of spruce you are getting. There are over 30 different varieties of spruce. Fir trees can often be confused with spruce (they can look almost identical in some cases) - and you really don't want to accidentally brew with fir. Beware of people selling "blue" or "green" spruce. If they don't know what kind of spruce it is, they may not even HAVE spruce!

Watch out for that quality! In looking at some of the competition, right in their own photos you can see all kinds of foreign debris in the packaging. We triple process all of our spruce to make sure you are getting the highest quality and concentration of spruce with the least amount of foreign material.

We own our own brewery. We know the importance of consistent, quality ingredients. We use our own products and hold ourselves to our own standards.

Ethics matter. We work closely with the National Forest Service. We are commercially permitted and give seasonal reports back to the forest service detailing forest health. And yes, that matters. Spruce forests from Alaska all the way down to New Mexico are struggling with the warmer temperatures. Commercial harvesting of spruce needs to be done while working closely with different Ranger Districts. It is illegal without a permit and unethical because it damages forests that are all ready struggling.

We use commercial grade vacuum packers, commercial grade BPA free plastics and walk in freezers to process and store our spruce. Everything is temperature stable and in the freshest environment possible until the day it leaves our shipping facility.

Shipping standards make a huge difference. We ship all of our products with ice packs, insulation and express shipping. Yes, our shipping is a bit more expensive but this way we are SURE the product arrives to you in good shape. If you have never used spruce tips before, how would you know if they got hot and ruined in shipping? And yes, they really do get ruined and put off a very different characteristic when they get hot. Ours stay happy and fresh all the way until they are in your hands.

These are just a few of the many things that Spruce On Tap brings to the table that other companies can not. You may pay a little more with us, but you will be getting what you pay for and you will love the end result!

You can trust the original - Spruce On Tap has been providing wild crafted spruce, juniper, yarrow and other ingredients for the craft community for over eight years! At Spruce On Tap you can be confident that you will be receiving the finest quality ingredients. As co-founders of Riff Raff Brewing Company and homebrewers and wild-craft lovers for years before going commercial, we know and understand the importance of the quality of the ingredients. We can recommend usage, boil times, addition calculation and dry hopping techniques. We are also able to provide assistance in attaining TTB and FDA approval. Questions? Please feel free to reach out to us! brew@spruceontap.com

Our Harvesting Processes & Ethics

At Spruce On Tap we love brewing, but we love trees too. We are adamant about making sure the trees are not over harvested and that the spruce tips are only harvested in areas where the spruce tree is thriving. We recognize that trees are the source of our fresh air and they are beautiful to boot, and we strive to protect them. All spruce tips are Wild Harvested primarily in the San Juan Mountain Range of southern Colorado, in the San Juan, Rio Grande and Uncompagre National Forests. We harvest both Colorado Blue Spruce tips and Engelmann Spruce tips. We harvest the spruce tips when they first begin to emerge from their brown, papery casings each spring. At this stage they are very tender and have the brightest flavor with slight mint, pine, melon and citrus notes.

FAQs

Check out the link Recipes & More at the top of the page to learn all about the history and uses of our products. Still have questions after that? Drop us a line. Phone and email are found at the bottom of the home page.